Interview: Rhys Carr of MOULIN ROUGE at BROADWAY AT THE HOBBY CENTER

Rhys Carr is making their National Tour Debut as part of the cast of the touring production of  MOULIN ROUGE, which comes as part of BROADWAY at the Hobby Center July 14th through the 19th! They are a graduate of Ohio University’s inaugural MT class. Co-Founder of Vibrancy Theater. BROADWAY WORLD writer Brett Cullum got a chance to talk with Rhys about their experiences with the spectacular spectacular world of this show. 

Brett Cullum: Well, the biggest question that I always wonder with people in this particular tour or this show, were you familiar with Moulin Rouge before you auditioned?

Rhys Carr: As for the musical, yes. I remember I was in school at OU, and Moulin Rouge had just come out, and I saw a few clips from rehearsals. Then I remember seeing several performances on Good Morning America, and I remember there was one specifically that was on the Tony Awards. And I remember watching that and being like, " Wow! That is incredible.” And even listening to some of the music from it, I had never seen the movie. Before I booked the job, I'll be very transparent about that. I found a way to watch clips and whatever else I needed to watch. There came a time, clearly, after I had graduated from school, when I was like, Moulin Rouge is on my list of shows I want to do. It was in the top 3, whether on Broadway or on tour, and I certainly did not expect the tour. Now that I've seen the movie. I understand the hype around it. What I will say, the movie is wild. I did not expect… the movie to be what it is, and so seeing the musical, I was like, wow, this feels very different, in a good way.

Brett Cullum: It is very different. I distinctly remember the movie coming out in 2001, and I went to see it on opening weekend 3 or 4 times. I had never seen anything like it. I don't think I've seen anything since. Unless you really count some other films from Baz Luhrmann, like Strictly Ballroom or something like that, but it is very unique, and I know that Baz was actually involved in making this, and coming back with this on Broadway and the tour. What's it like to be part of this cast? How many people are onstage?

Rhys Carr: I wanna say… about… If we're also counting swings onstage and offstage, I wanna say it's about… 30-ish? It's a big company. It's certainly one of the bigger companies that I've been in, in terms of shows, and it's pretty involved all throughout. A lot of our ensemble covers, principals, a lot of us, have done different cover things in the past. We have a really awesome team of swings. And understudies that are really incredible, and also make the show what it is and bring such new life to it, and also save us whenever our onstage company members are really down for the count. I've never been part of a company that is, that is this close. We all generally get along pretty well. We all hang out all the time. A lot of times, it's like, where are we all going? All 30 of us, squeezing into whatever bar it is. It's very communal, and I really appreciate that, especially because tour life can be really isolating. This is my first tour, and it's the longest I've ever been away from home. 

The show is so physically, vocally, and emotionally demanding. We give a lot to the show and to the stage, so I think there has to be some sort of support offstage; otherwise, we can't show up for each other on stage, and it makes it that much harder to give our full selves. There are even times when I feel like I'm exhausted from the show, and I try to go maybe try to reserve some energy, and it's hard to find that balance just based on how it's structured, and so it's really helpful to have people in your corner, that are understanding the place, the position that you're in, and that are ready to joke around, or that are ready to be like, “Hey, I think you need some space, I'm gonna give you some space,” or vice versa. It's a really great community, and I'm really blessed to have it.

Brett Cullum: Well, how long have you been on this tour, and how long does it go for, do you know?

Rhys Carr: I have been on the Moulin Rouge tour for two years, actually, coming up. I started rehearsals in late May of 2024, and my first show was on July 13th, 2024. It's weird that it's been two years. My birthday is on July 14th, actually, and so this'll be my third birthday with Moulin Rouge, which is kind of crazy. We actually only have a few more weeks on tour. Our last performance will be on August 2nd in Boston, where the tour opened. This job, I think, has been… a really incredible first big gig, so I feel really blessed to be able to close it out. It's a really cool legacy to be part of, particularly the touring production and the touring company. Seeing everyone from past versions of the tour come back and do it again kind of creates a nice through line. Yeah, I feel really blessed to be a part of the touring cast, and to be… to have met the people I've met on my two years here.

Brett Cullum: Well, have you ever counted how many songs are actually in this thing? Has anybody, like, racked that up?

Rhys Carr: I have not counted, but I believe it's written down somewhere as, like, 72 or 75. Not full songs, but at least references to songs in the show itself. I'm reminded of how many songs are in the show whenever I'm at a grocery store. at a club, at a drag brunch, at whatever it is, a song from Moulin Rouge will probably play at least once, if not several songs in a night, or in a day. And it's so interesting, I even learned new songs that I had not known before joining the tour. And I remember hearing them outside of the tour and being like, “That's the name of that song? I had no idea, did not know that.” It's a lot of music. I've never been in a show where I get to sing Lady Gaga, Beyoncé, and Whitney Houston in the same show. Which I think is pretty cool. 

Brett Cullum: How did you get into acting and singing?

Rhys Carr: I've always been a very musical kid. I've always been a kid who likes to move. I've put on little plays with my family, loved Disney, and always wanted to dance and perform. Even while I was playing sports, theater kept pulling me back. I spent years doing community theater and summer productions in Ohio, and those mentors helped prepare me for a career in musical theater.

Brett Cullum: You went to Ohio University, and it says that you were in the first class for musical theater.

Rhys Carr: Yes, coincidentally enough. I don't know why fate works in mysterious ways. It was in my senior year of high school that my voice teacher at Ohio University, who has a vocal program for non-university students, that's for 5-18. And I was in that program for about 4 years, from freshman year to senior year, and my vocal teacher, Melissa Brock, told me, "Hey, there's a musical theater program that's starting right when you graduate. I know you wanna go to New York, I know you wanna go to a bigger school, maybe, but this program's right here, you'd be a part of the first class. That's a pretty iconic opportunity.” It was maybe the best decision I could have made at the time, both financially and emotionally. I've met some of my best friends at that school. I've met some amazing colleagues who I can now also call mentors. And it was really interesting to be the first class of an inaugural program. In many ways, we set the precedent for what to do and what not to do in the program. We went through a lot of changes that were really hard. It was a really interesting time in my life, and I do look back on it fondly. Even when it was really difficult, I had a lot of great friends I could lean on. And I had a lot of really great community that we created, and I still talk to a lot of them to this day. I'm actually going to a friend's wedding from that program in September, in London, which I'm very excited about. 

Brett Cullum: Yeah. Well, this tour is obviously wrapping up. Do you have anything lined up next, or are you just kind of auditioning?

Rhys Carr: It's been a great journey. It's also been a very long and straining journey on my voice and my body. And it's the longest contract I've ever done, certainly of this caliber, so… I think it's gonna be really interesting to see how my body and my, just, me, acclimates to not doing Moulin Rouge every day, sometimes twice a day. 

As much as I am nervous about the unknown, I can't lie, it definitely does scare me a little bit. Not knowing what the future holds. I'm also excited. I've actually made a list of things I would like to do post-tour, and I'm super excited. I'm really excited to grow out my hair, because I used to have longer hair before I joined the tour, and then I had to… I cut it before I auditioned, and that's what they stuck with. I'm excited to get back into roller skating. I used to roller skate, and I was gonna get into it, and then I moved, and then there was just no time. I wanna learn how to DJ. I really wanna learn how to DJ. I feel like I'd be very good at it. And I just wanna create more! I've been kind of in a creative slump as of late, because I use so much of my energy in the show that I don't always have enough left in the tank, and… before I joined the tour, I remember I was choreographing so much more, and I just had all these ideas, and… I'm really excited to return to that, and to sing more often for fun, and, like, collaborate with friends, and collaborate on shows and readings, and see shows and readings, and then, like, later down the line, I want to get a cat. I'm super excited to be able to, like, come into a new chap- to close this chapter, and to start a new one, and whatever that chapter is, I'm curious about. Even if I'm a little bit scared.

Brett Cullum: I think that's normal. Moulin Rouge comes as part of the Broadway at the Hobby Center July 14th through the 19th. I am so excited to see you on the stage, and to see what all you do, and all the razzle-dazzle. It's certainly a spectacular, spectacular. Lives up to the hype, for sure. So, break legs, and we'll see ya at the Moulin Rouge!

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